About

The plucky heroes mess with their warp drive, throwing themselves halfway across the galaxy. They find the nearest planet and dock at the space station, looking to restock and find some information. They ask the first person they meet where they are...

With Concept Cards you have the answers, even if you didn't know what the questions would be.

The Basic Questions

Who? GMs and Storytellers who like Sci-Fi stories, and want to make theirs better with less prep required.

What? Decks of playing cards with detailed ideas on each card, fully thought out and each with five aspects that tie together to create a coherent whole.

Where? In your pocket, or your gaming pack, a deck of cards will easily fit with what you're already carrying.

When? Arriving at your door in April. 90% of the cards are finished - we're just waiting on final art and the funds to actually pay the printers.

Why? Because when you plan for A, B and C, the players choose 7; you can never prepare for everything, but you don't have to if you have a decks of people, planets and/or places to hand.

How? Back the Kickstarter!

Structure of the Cards

Each Concept Card deck is also a standard 54 card deck of playing cards - with the same four suits as any other playing cards.

Unlike regular playing cards however while they have one primary suit they also have values in the other three, each with their own meaning:

While most of what's on the card is obvious immediately upon encountering the person/planet/place there's always something a little more hidden that can serve as a further plot hook if the players (or you) have a strong interest in that particular concept.

Testimonials

What people are saying about our previous, fantasy themed, Concept Cards.

"Excellent for seeking inspiration when writing plots, or for smoothing things over at the gaming table.
I've added depth to existing characters and named new people, towns, and even a type of poison, very versatile" -- Matt

"I've used the previous deck for a running a space exploration Rogue Trader game. I generated new worlds, people and plot at random from the deck every week. This gave a great sense of novelty to each session as even I didn't know what was coming each week." -- Laurie

The Adventures of Lil Cthulhu

Inspired by Amber Woy's excellent youtube video, and because we had a lovely plushie to hand, we decided to tell a sample story using the cards and a Great Young One.

You'll need an HTML5 capable browser to see this content.

Replay with sound

Play with sound

00:00

00:00

Off

English

Stretch Goals

We have ideas in our heads that £3000 won't let us afford, so as is traditional we're putting out some stretch goals:

£3750: Two More Cards

With the base goal we'll be putting explanations of how the cards work, and suggestions on alternate uses, into the deck as cards themselves - taking up 2 valuable card slots. With £3750 we can happily add pamphlets to each deck, freeing up those two cards for more concepts.

£4500: More Art

With the base goal we're using 5 different suit symbols - two for clubs and one for each other suit. At this point we'll upgrade to 8 symbols, giving each deck a mixture with appropriate connotations.

£????: Even More Art

Of course, while 8 symbols is better than five, 12 is even better - one perfectly suited to each deck.

£????: ?????

We have more thoughts of things we could do, but we don't know which ones will be feasible, and which are pipe dreams - so we won't be announcing them until we get closer to the necessary funds.

Oskar needs his ship modified so he can carry cargo between the Zetras... and maybe weapons for the revolution

Risks and challenges

We're a four person team out of which 3 of us have health issues which can possibly interfere with our work-rate - so we've made sure that prior to launch we have 90% of the cards (146 out of 162), meaning that even if we end up in the worst case scenario, working at 1/4 speed for the month after launch, we'll still be on schedule.

Some of the stretch goals require working with artists - and as always when working with other people there is a risk of them not delivering on time (or at all) but we've made sure to have contacts with multiple different artists who can work on the tasks, so that should anything major go wrong we'll have a backup plan.